3ABN On the Road

Secrets Of The Nile

Three Angels Broadcasting Network

Program transcript

Participants: Pr. Tony Moore

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Series Code: OTR

Program Code: OTR000707


01:01 Well, welcome back again to three Angels,
01:03 we're glad you're back for part two
01:05 of the archeology seminar with Tony Moore.
01:08 Last night was just amazing and our last seminar together
01:10 and tonight we're looking forward to just more
01:12 information that I think will be useful to you.
01:14 You know, I came away from last night
01:16 just more impressed that the Bible can be trusted.
01:19 How about you?
01:21 And tonight when we come back, we're gonna just be growing
01:25 in our confidence in God's Word.
01:26 I'm looking forward, not only to tonight but tomorrow night,
01:30 where we're gonna talking about Iraq or Iraq,
01:33 I think is the real way to say it, Iraq,
01:35 in Bible prophecy and when Iraq ruled the world.
01:38 Well, tonight let's just bow our heads and ask the Lord
01:41 to bless us as we begin this special program this evening.
01:45 Father in Heaven, we're indeed grateful
01:48 that as we dig up the future, as we dig up the past
01:53 that tell us not only about the past but also the future.
01:56 And archeology points toward those ancient prophecies
02:00 and tonight, as Tony Moore shares
02:02 and as we grow together,
02:04 we just ask Your presence to be with us.
02:06 We thank You and we come in the all powerful
02:10 and all worthy name of Christ, amen.
02:13 Again, Rafael Scarfullery, we're glad that he's with us
02:17 and he's gonna be playing for us this evening.
02:21 "I'm just a wayfaring stranger."
06:10 Thank you so much, Rafael, that was truly lovely.
06:15 It's great to with you again this evening as we're prepared
06:17 to take a journey to the far land of the Nile.
06:20 How many of you've been over the Nile?
06:24 One? Only one other person has been to Egypt, wow.
06:29 Well, you're in for a special treat tonight.
06:30 Let me tell you where we're going,
06:32 we're gonna go and survey the entire land.
06:35 We're gonna look at the monuments,
06:36 the background, the story.
06:38 And then we're gonna ask the question,
06:40 where would Joseph and Moses fit
06:43 into Egyptian history as we know it today.
06:45 And so it's gonna be a special journey.
06:47 Our next episode is going to be "In the footsteps of Jesus."
06:50 And I really want to encourage you to be here for that.
06:52 We'll be serving the entire land.
06:55 We'll look at the background of the story and I guarantee
06:58 that the gospel story of Jesus will come to life
07:00 as never before for you.
07:02 As we're able to unite the pictures of the places
07:05 where they happened and the description
07:07 and it's really, really special,
07:08 but tonight we want to take a journey,
07:11 "Amazing Discoveries in the Land of the Nile."
07:14 Egypt, the very name stirs our minds with wonder.
07:19 Pyramids, Sphinx, mummys, Tootencarmoon.
07:23 Egypt seems to hold a spell over our imaginations.
07:26 What are the mysteries of these ancient buildings?
07:29 Do they posses mystical powers,
07:31 why were they built and by whom?
07:34 Herodotus, an early road traveler said,
07:35 "Egypt has wonders more in number than any other land.
07:39 And works it has to show beyond expression great."
07:43 Tonight I want to take you on a fascinating journey
07:46 to the wonderful land of the pyramids to investigate
07:49 the wonders that impressed Herodotus 2,500 years ago.
07:53 But first I want to take you to Cairo.
07:55 Cairo is the capital of the modern Egypt,
07:58 it's one of the worlds largest cities.
08:00 It's situated on the edge of the desert
08:03 with the population over 15 million people.
08:07 It's a crowded, dusty, noisy city
08:10 and yet it is one of my favorite cities.
08:12 It's a vibrant city.
08:14 It has a unique combination of open, friendly people
08:16 with thousands of buildings and monuments,
08:19 spanning nearly 5 millenniums.
08:22 From Pharonic to modern with Greek Roman,
08:25 Coptic, Muslim, thrown in for good measure.
08:28 Cairo is a wonderful city of contrast,
08:30 from the dry sands of the desert
08:32 to the life giving waters of the Nile.
08:35 And the people who make their living collecting and sorting
08:37 the garbage to the socially elite,
08:39 Cairo is the very heartbeat of Egypt.
08:43 Now traveling in Cairo is always an exciting experience.
08:46 You're presented with many challenges,
08:48 many different opportunities, antiquated street cars
08:51 or the age old-- or modern subways,
08:54 dilapidated busses or by the ago old feluccas.
08:57 Speedy taxis or of course you can go by
09:00 the time honored method of going by foot.
09:02 Each outing can be an exciting and accelerating experience.
09:06 Like the time I wanted in to the Khan El Khalili-Bazaar
09:09 where the famous Egyptian cotton fabrics are sold.
09:12 This truck could not make the turn down a crowded,
09:14 narrow street, so a group of men literally swarmed around
09:17 and picked up the truck and pointed it
09:19 in the desired direction.
09:20 And this man had the fastest iron in the east.
09:22 He sprayed a mist of water from this mouth,
09:24 ironed djellaba with his feet and folded it with his hands.
09:29 I have to admit how I really-- my favorites leisure activity
09:33 in Cairo is strolling by the Nile
09:35 in the cool of the evening.
09:37 I enjoy seeing the sailors working their boats
09:40 in the cities skylight at night.
09:42 And it seems to be a favorite of the locals too,
09:44 for the sidewalks are always full of Cairoites,
09:47 enjoying their river by the cool of the day.
09:50 Well, the Nile has been the source of life
09:53 for Egypt throughout the centuries.
09:56 Herodotus, that early world traveler said
09:58 Egypt is the land of the Nile
10:01 and the Nile is the gift of the Gods.
10:04 For over four millenniums this river has nourished
10:08 one of earth's greatest civilizations.
10:11 Indeed the Egypt's very existence
10:13 is always depended upon the Nile.
10:16 From its source in the mountainous rainforest
10:19 in Central Africa, it pushes northward
10:21 for nearly 4, 000 miles, to the searing sands
10:25 of the Sahara Desert until it empties
10:27 into the Mediterranean sea.
10:29 Egypt could be thought it was an island floating
10:31 in the midst of Sahara desert.
10:34 An island floating in the midst of the Sahara desert,
10:36 it's bound by the Arabian desert to the east
10:39 and the Libyan desert to the west.
10:40 The Mediterranean Sea to the north
10:42 and the great, great Cataract Aswan to the south.
10:45 It only had one natural border to defend and because of that,
10:50 it-- ancient Egypt prospered to the years.
10:55 For over 50 millenniums.
10:58 I'm sorry, for over 50 centuries,
11:00 99% of the people have lived on 1% of the land.
11:04 Ancient Egyptians call it the black land.
11:07 It's known as Abyssinian carpet
11:09 and has some of the richest farmland in the world.
11:11 Now the life sustaining Nile valley,
11:13 it varies from 1 to 15 miles in width,
11:15 with a desert as an ever present reality.
11:19 The line of demarcation is so distinct
11:21 and so unforgiving that you can literally step
11:23 with one step from the black farmland
11:25 to the red sands of the Sahara desert.
11:28 It is a special place to travel to.
11:31 The first cataract at Aswan was a series of
11:35 rapids full of sharp rocks that rendered
11:37 the region impassible by boats.
11:39 It was formed by a ridge of granite that--
11:41 it was lying across the river and from that ridge of granite,
11:45 some of Egypt's greatest temples and tombs
11:48 and obelisks were carved.
11:52 It was 750 miles up river from the Mediterranean
11:55 and as a result it was quite protected it.
11:59 It was a border fortress, down into Africa
12:03 and so during times of peace Aswan served as a border,
12:08 as a strategic trading post and then turn--
12:12 time during times of war, it was the last defense,
12:14 before enemies might try and come into the land.
12:18 Near Aswan the large temple of the Abu Simbel.
12:24 Wait, we're gonna back up just a second, I'm sorry.
12:27 I want to tell you about the great Aswan high dam
12:29 and this was considered by many people
12:31 to be the 8th Wonder of the World.
12:33 When the Egyptians build this, they formed the lake
12:35 that was some 310 miles long and 6 miles wide.
12:39 It flooded the land of Nubia and many villages
12:42 had to take refuge upon the shores of Lake Nasser
12:45 along with 14 temples that were moved to higher ground.
12:49 The large temple of Abu Simbel,
12:52 a 170 miles south of Aswan became a symbol
12:55 of global solidarity in a section of the world
12:58 that is marked by struggle and war.
13:00 Now this temple was constructed by
13:03 Ramses the Great, but it has to be moved
13:05 212 feet above its original location.
13:08 And so they cut it into over a thousand jigsaw pieces
13:12 and then they made this molded hill to look like
13:15 the original cliffs and they reconstructed the temple
13:17 212 feet above where it originally stood.
13:21 Today, Aswan is a busy, somewhat prosperous city
13:25 due to the construction of the great Aswan high dam
13:28 and the industry that it had created.
13:30 Yet it still retains
13:31 the characteristics of a small village.
13:34 Now it's just offshore, a couple of hundred yards
13:36 is Elephantine Island.
13:37 If we see this strange name from that rock formation,
13:40 that looked like an elephants face.
13:42 I went out to examine the nilometer,
13:45 a gauge used for measuring
13:48 the rise and fall of the Nile River.
13:51 As Nile would rise, the water inside the building
13:53 would rise and they can measure it against the markings
13:56 and they could predict the annual floods
13:59 and of course they could predict the fall,
14:01 the harvest that would come.
14:03 Which used by the ancient Egyptians by the Greeks,
14:06 by the Romans, by the Coptic's,
14:08 and of course by the Muslims to determine
14:09 the planning times and predict the harvest.
14:12 Now today, this is an island of contrast
14:14 on the north end is this plush, 5 star hotel,
14:17 but then you cross over the wall
14:19 on to the southern half and you step back in time,
14:21 into a Nubian village.
14:23 The people were very open and friendly.
14:25 I met a charming school teacher there and his wife.
14:28 They insisted that I come to their home
14:31 and have tea with them.
14:33 We sat down in their home and she prepared our tea
14:36 on this mud brick oven and pretty soon,
14:41 the amaya, the woman's mother came.
14:43 Pretty soon her sister in law came
14:46 and the whole living room filled up.
14:48 As we sat and said, we set to sip tea
14:51 and watch the daily soap opera.
14:54 Something's don't change around the world.
14:58 Well, there are few bends in the Nile River,
15:01 and it's perfect for river traffic.
15:03 The prevailing wind blowing from the north
15:05 makes sailing south a breeze and the current flowing
15:09 from the south makes the return trip almost effortless.
15:13 But since the erection of the high dam,
15:14 the Nile no longer floods Egypt but life is still just
15:18 as depended upon it today, as it was 4,000 years ago.
15:22 You see, it's a source of irrigation and drinking water
15:25 for the towns and villages, even the distant resorts,
15:28 150 miles away on the Red Sea.
15:30 They have to import their fresh water from the Nile
15:33 since literally no rain falls there.
15:36 Although there are roads and train tracks paralleling it,
15:39 the Nile is still the life blood of Egypt.
15:42 Today the massive luxury ships are joined
15:45 by the age owned feluccas,
15:46 plying the waters of this ancient land.
15:50 Three remarkable facts stand about out about Egypt,
15:52 I want to share with you tonight.
15:53 First, the culture, the climate is so dry
15:56 that things made thousands of years ago
15:59 have survived to the modern era.
16:02 Second, the development of writing preserved
16:05 a historical account of their beliefs and achievements.
16:11 Third, since their religion depicted--
16:14 their religion viewed death as an extension
16:16 of the present life, they portrayed that life
16:20 in colorful wall painting in their tombs.
16:23 They carved scenes from life and put them into their tombs
16:26 and they've come down to us today,
16:28 so we have a window into their life if the past.
16:32 Now the lack of rainfall in the desert
16:34 makes Egypt an archeologist paradise.
16:38 While it occasionally rains in Lower Egypt, in Cairo,
16:42 it almost never rains in Upper Egypt in the south
16:45 and places like Luxor and Aswan.
16:48 And because of this, things formed years ago
16:50 have survived to the modern times.
16:53 Now you're familiar with the mummies,
16:55 they have their skin still in place today.
16:58 This lady still sports the perm she received 3,000 years ago.
17:02 But did you know that there are perfectly preserved bodies
17:06 of people who have found buried in the desert of Egypt,
17:11 who had not been mummified.
17:13 This man on the screen was nicknamed Ginger
17:16 because of his hair color.
17:17 They found him in a shallow grave
17:19 at the edge of the desert,
17:20 his finger nails and toe nails were still intact.
17:22 They called him ginger because of the color of his hair.
17:26 The amazing thing is that the hot sands of the desert
17:29 had naturally preserved him for over 4,000 years.
17:33 Now the Egyptian belief in the after life
17:35 revolved around the Ka and the Ba.
17:38 At death, they believed, the Ka
17:40 or the invisible double person was released to go off
17:42 into some other existence.
17:44 They believe that would dwell near that the deceased
17:47 if it could recognize the person who had died.
17:52 If it could recognize the person who had died.
17:54 So tombs were often called houses for the Ka to live.
17:59 Now it was critical that the Ka could recognize the deceased,
18:02 I don't want you to miss this point,
18:03 it's very important.
18:04 If the body decayed then the Ka would wander
18:08 aimlessly seeking the person from whom it was released.
18:12 Now this was no problem as long as you were buried
18:15 in the dry sands of the desert like Ginger.
18:18 But when royalty began to be buried under the ground in pits
18:23 and to be buried in stone tombs
18:25 their bodies naturally decayed.
18:27 Well, this presented quite a problem.
18:29 What would they do?
18:30 So they began to experiment
18:33 as to what they would do to preserve the bodies.
18:37 The early dynasties begin to experiment
18:40 with preserving the bodies of the deceased,
18:43 the result today is known as mummification.
18:47 Right, mummification, now the word embalm
18:50 comes from the Latin--
18:51 it means to put into aromatics resins.
18:54 The Arabic word is actually --
18:57 and because many were coated with a dark resin.
19:00 Now we don't have very many first hand accounts
19:03 of the practice but Herodotus, who went down,
19:05 he interviewed several practitioners
19:07 and this is what he told us had happened.
19:09 When a person died, they reached
19:11 inside of the skull with a means of an iron hook,
19:14 through the nose and they pull the brain out.
19:18 And then the cut the body opened and they took out
19:21 the organs and placed them into various jars.
19:23 Then they washed the body and then they packed it
19:26 in natron to be dehydrated for 70 days
19:30 and then they wrapped it in strips of linen
19:32 and then at the end of 70 days,
19:33 they had a very elaborate ceremony.
19:35 You can see it here on the screen.
19:37 You can see the man on the right, he's a priest.
19:39 You can he's a priest because he's got a leopard skin on
19:41 and then the man on the left, who's all dressed in white.
19:44 He's deceased, and so now the priest is coming,
19:47 at the end of the 70 days to do a special ceremony,
19:50 it was the called the opening of the mouth ceremony,
19:52 to allow his Ka to return to him
19:55 so this is what they believed.
19:57 Well, tourism has been a big business in Egypt
20:00 for over 4,000 years.
20:02 When Herodotus visited Egypt 2,500 years ago
20:05 the hieroglyphs that were inscribed
20:08 on the temple walls were still understood.
20:10 When Napoleon marched his army however down into Egypt
20:14 in the 1790's, they gazed in wonder
20:18 at the massive stone remnants
20:21 of the world's greatest civilization.
20:23 As they paraded on the Giza Plateau in the shadow
20:25 of the Great Pyramid of Cheops, their emperor addressed them,
20:28 "Soldiers of France, four thousand years
20:31 of history look down upon you."
20:34 There are before them stood the same
20:37 ancient temples and tombs and obelisks and pyramids
20:40 that Harada disengaged upon 2,500 years earlier
20:44 but unfortunately, the details of that history
20:47 were vague and incomplete.
20:49 In vain, the conquerors sought to decipher
20:52 the mysterious writing in the rock,
20:54 chiseled under the rocks.
20:55 Its meaning had been lost for nearly 2,000 years.
21:00 Napoleon however, was more than a soldier of fortune.
21:03 He had a passion for antiquity
21:04 and so he had a group of scholars with him.
21:06 And when the British were invading
21:08 the northern part of the delta, the soldiers were actually
21:11 fortifying a fort at a place called Rashid Rosetta
21:15 and as they were fortifying this fort,
21:16 they were throwing stones, rubble and they had to make
21:19 the walls thicker and one of the stones they picked up,
21:22 they noticed inscriptions on it.
21:24 It turned out to be a tri-lingual inscription,
21:27 known today as the Rosetta Stone.
21:31 Now they set it aside and later on scholars
21:34 begin to examine it and they hoped that it told
21:37 the same story because on the top it had hieroglyphs
21:41 and then in the middle it had another writing
21:42 called the demotic that was the cursive form
21:45 of hieroglyphs and then down the bottom it was in Greek
21:48 and so they were hoping that all three stories would tell--
21:50 all three languages would tell the same story
21:53 and that perhaps they could use this as key
21:56 to be able to understand the hieroglyphs.
21:59 And indeed that is what happened.
22:03 Twenty-four years later, this man
22:05 Jean Francois Champollion, was able to break into
22:09 the silent world of pharaonic writing and immediately,
22:12 old Egypt began to reveal her secrets.
22:17 As I mentioned earlier, the Egyptian religious concept
22:20 revolved around immortality.
22:23 Their word for tomb meant the house for eternity.
22:28 During the first two dynasties, massive tombs were constructed
22:33 in the mud brick imitation of the Mesopotamian style.
22:37 But about 200 years after the first dynasty,
22:40 a gigantic engineering leap took place as tombs
22:44 began to be constructed, not out of mud brick,
22:47 but out of stone.
22:49 Some stone blocks weighing up to 20 tons.
22:53 Imhotep was the vizier of King Djoser,
22:56 he pioneered the way by building,
22:58 what's known today as the step pyramid,
23:00 it was the first large scale building
23:02 constructed on the planet.
23:03 It consisted of six diminishing squares,
23:06 placed on top of one another.
23:08 It's the first recognizable member of the family of tombs
23:11 know today as pyramids.
23:14 In its ruins a seated statue of Djoser
23:17 has survived for over 4,000 years.
23:20 During the next millennium, every king of substance
23:24 and authority would be buried under or in a pyramid.
23:28 But by the end of the era, many would be small
23:31 and constructed from mud brick, a great departure,
23:34 from the plentiful and splendid visions of the past.
23:37 But less than 100 years after Djoser's craftsmen
23:40 began working on the step pyramid,
23:42 work began on the largest stone building ever made by man,
23:47 the Great Pyramid of Cheops on the Giza Plateau.
23:51 It's a gigantic structure composed of over two million,
23:55 three hundred thousand blocks, weighing on average,
23:58 two and a half tons each.
24:01 Now originally it towered over 480 feet high,
24:06 it covers 13 acres at its base.
24:08 But even more amazing than the size of the pyramid
24:12 was the accuracy with which it was constructed.
24:15 It's oriented almost exactly in line with true north.
24:19 The four corners form perfect right angles.
24:23 Now unfortunately, no two sides are exactly the same.
24:26 It's-- about 755 feet each,
24:29 no two sides are exactly the same,
24:32 but the difference between the longest and shortest side
24:35 is less than 8 inches.
24:37 How could the ancient Egyptians
24:41 build their pyramids so precisely?
24:44 Well, they're all sorts of wild theories that have been
24:46 suggested from divine intervention
24:48 to assistance from outer space.
24:51 Speculations have run from the occult sciences,
24:54 to the levitation of the blocks by priests,
24:57 to even sophisticated machines
24:59 that we've lost the knowledge of.
25:00 It's even been hypothesized by some,
25:03 that the pyramids are really a divine work, a prophecy,
25:07 revealing the history and future of our world.
25:11 Herodotus said that it took 100,000 slaves 30 years
25:15 to build the pyramid of Cheops.
25:18 How does that fit with the information that we have today?
25:22 Could the pyramids have been built
25:25 without modern machines or engineering techniques?
25:28 Well, the archeological evidence would suggest
25:31 that they did not possess the wheel
25:33 or even the block and tackle.
25:35 That they did not have iron tools,
25:37 they only had simple copper tools.
25:39 Well, did they have super natural assistance?
25:42 Were they aided by visitors from
25:43 outer space or the occult sciences?
25:45 Well, actually there's no need for such fantasies.
25:48 It could have been built with the
25:49 simplest of tools and technologies.
25:51 Before they actually began to haul the stones,
25:53 they had two problems, two challenges.
25:56 And that was they had to level the plateau
26:00 and then they had to plot the angles
26:02 and the orientation of the building.
26:05 Well, this Plain of Giza was chosen because of its height
26:08 above the flooding Nile River
26:10 and the close proximity of a limestone quarry.
26:14 The area first had to be cleared
26:16 of the gravel and the sand.
26:17 They went down to bed rock
26:19 and then it was surrounded by a low brick wall.
26:22 And flooded measurements were take,
26:24 the trenches were cut, when the water was drained,
26:26 it was a simple matter to level the area to an equal depth.
26:32 It received its true northward orientation
26:35 by being aligned with the circumpolar stars.
26:39 While the plateau was being leveled,
26:41 thousands of workers, quarried limestone
26:43 with copper tools, those two and a half ton
26:46 blocks were floated to the edge of the river.
26:49 The edge of the Giza Plateau during the annual flood
26:52 and they were often described with the "vigorous gang"
26:56 and the "boat gang," but what about that granite
26:59 that was used from Aswan?
27:02 Cooper tools could never cut granite.
27:04 Iron would not be discovered for another thousand years.
27:07 How could they cut that, this Aswanian granite?
27:12 Well, they used special diorite hammers,
27:15 a very hard stone and they were able to chip
27:18 rough gutters into the granite and then as they chipped
27:21 that rough gutters, they were able to take
27:23 wooden wedges and fit them down in and pour water on it
27:25 and then the water would then of course expand in the wood
27:28 and it would cause the stone to crack.
27:32 And then they were able to take those,
27:33 those hard stones of diorite and they were able to just
27:36 chisel it out and make it smooth.
27:38 And then they were able to fashion the stones,
27:42 some of them weighing 70 tones and put them on barges
27:47 and ship them 500 miles down
27:49 to be used in the great pyramids tombs.
27:53 A fascinating story.
27:55 Well, the fine Tura limestone once completely covered
28:00 the Great Pyramids of Giza,
28:02 reflecting the rays of the sun in a dazzling display.
28:05 It's been scavenged through the years
28:07 to be used in other buildings.
28:09 Now only Chefren's Pyramid
28:12 wears that original limestone cap.
28:15 It looks larger than his father Cheops,
28:17 but this is due to the fact
28:18 that it sits upon higher ground.
28:21 So why did Herodotus tell us that
28:23 there are 100,000 workers working for 30 years?
28:27 Why did he say that they had machines and iron tools?
28:32 Think about this fact.
28:34 The pyramids were more distant from Herodotus in his day
28:39 than the Colosseum is from us in our day.
28:42 Okay, the pyramids were more distance
28:45 from Herodotus in his day, than the Colosseum in Rome
28:48 is from us in our day.
28:50 Herodotus mistook his guide or priest,
28:55 he thought he had special information,
28:57 this man here by the Sphinx also thought
29:00 he has special information.
29:02 I met him and as we talk that evening,
29:05 he promised to take me in the morning
29:09 to a special meditation room inside of this phoenix.
29:13 If only I would pay the fee tonight.
29:18 Well, there are many charlatans even today.
29:21 The Sphinx seems to symbolize all that is
29:24 strange and mystical about ancient Egypt.
29:27 It was carved from a large rock out cropping
29:30 in the limestone quarry below the pyramids.
29:32 Its lion shaped body is 240 feet long
29:35 and 66 feet high, the 13 foot wide face
29:39 is that of-- a portrait of its builder,
29:41 Chefren, whose limestone capped tombs stands above it.
29:46 The Sphinx is an Egyptian phrase for a living being
29:49 that fused together the features of
29:51 king and lion and man.
29:53 But there's nothing about the great Sphinx
29:56 that is harder to understand than its tremendous age.
30:01 According to the stele that's found
30:03 between the paws of the Sphinx,
30:05 a young prince was running in the desert
30:07 and he paused to take a nap in the shadow of the Sphinx
30:09 or in the shade of the Sphinx.
30:11 And according to the story, as the price slept,
30:14 the Sphinx began to talk to him.
30:16 You see, sand had blown in, it was covering up the arms,
30:18 the paws of the Sphinx
30:20 and so the Sphinx spoke to him, according to the legend,
30:22 according to the story between the--
30:24 on the stele and it said,
30:25 if you clean the sand off of my paws,
30:29 I will make you the ruler of the two lands.
30:33 Well, the young man indeed heard that.
30:36 His name was Prince Tuthmosis IV,
30:38 he cleared the sand of Egypt
30:40 and he became pharaoh 34 centuries ago.
30:45 And at that time,
30:46 the Sphinx was already a 1,000 years old.
30:49 Well, I went out to this Sphinx at 4:30 in the morning
30:51 because I wanted to photograph that stele
30:55 before the guards or the tourist arrive
30:58 because I wanted to get some--
30:59 because I want to get a close up of it,
31:02 because it casts an interesting light
31:03 upon the Hebrew scriptures.
31:04 You see, Tuthmosis IV was not the oldest son of his father.
31:11 However, his brother unexpectedly died
31:16 and he became pharaoh.
31:18 Some people wonder was he the one of the Exodus.
31:21 Did this take place during that time?
31:23 Well, let me read to you what's actually a translation
31:26 from what's on the stele.
31:28 This is between the paws of the Sphinx.
31:30 It says, "On one such day it so happened
31:32 that the king's son Tuthmosis had come hunting at noon
31:35 and afterwards resting
31:37 in the shadow of this great god.
31:39 Sleep seized him and he found the majestic deity
31:41 speaking to him as a father speaks to his child.
31:44 'Look at me, Tuthmosis, my son,
31:47 I am your father, Horus-in-the-Horizon.
31:50 I promise what is my gift,
31:52 earthly rule at the head of all the living.
31:55 Seated on the throne of the earth-god
31:56 you will wear the White Crown and the Red.
31:59 All the territory n which
32:00 the eye of the sun rests will be yours.
32:03 Yours the food of the two lands,
32:04 great tribute and long life.
32:07 To you I turn my face and heart for protection,
32:10 since I am sick in all my limbs.
32:12 The sands of the holy place
32:14 upon which I rest have covered me.'"
32:17 True to his promise he cleared the sand
32:20 and built mud brick retaining walls
32:22 to prevent it from seeping back in
32:24 and indeed he became pharaoh.
32:26 Now we've investigated how the pyramids were built,
32:29 now we need to know why.
32:31 Why would any civilization invest
32:33 such tremendous expenditures of energy and money
32:37 to build these massive mounts of stone?
32:41 To understand the reason for the pyramids,
32:45 I want to remind you
32:46 of the religious beliefs of the Egyptians,
32:49 their beliefs of death and immortality.
32:52 They believed the king could survive bodily death
32:56 and bless Egypt from the afterworld through his Ka,
33:00 if the Ka could survive to see the body preserved.
33:06 Otherwise, it would aimlessly roam
33:08 through the earth seeking it.
33:09 That's why they embalm the bodies
33:11 that we talked about earlier.
33:12 That's why they fashioned masks of wood
33:15 and masks of gold, resembling the features of the deceased.
33:19 Now the royal tombs evolved from deep pits
33:23 in the desert to giant pyramids
33:25 but they were all built on the west bank of the Nile.
33:28 You see, the Egyptians saw the sun set in the west
33:31 and they said, well, that's clear,
33:34 but the sun would rise in the east
33:35 and so they said we want to identify with the sun.
33:38 And so even though we die and be buried,
33:40 we want to rise in the morning
33:42 and so they built all of their tombs
33:44 on the west bank of the Nile.
33:46 They were identifying with the static sun
33:48 and the setting sun in their static world
33:51 but unfortunately for the pharaohs,
33:54 their gigantic mausoleums advertised the location
33:58 of undreamed of wealth for grave robbers.
34:01 And so, the grave robbers came
34:03 and they stole all of the riches from the tombs.
34:06 And the new kingdom, a thousand years later,
34:08 they would be hidden in the cliffs
34:11 of the west bank of the Nile down at Luxor and Thebes.
34:15 But ultimately, this didn't work either.
34:16 There was too much wealth
34:17 being buried with these pharaohs.
34:19 Only one tomb has come down intact
34:21 from that amazing period.
34:24 You know him as King Tut or Tutankhamun.
34:28 But before I share the fascinating story
34:30 of how his tomb was discovered,
34:33 I want to take a moment and look at Egyptian history
34:37 and see where we might find
34:38 the biblical story of Moses and Joseph.
34:42 I want to back up just a moment
34:43 to the beginning of the second millennium B.C.
34:46 there was a Semitic group from Palestine
34:48 known as the Hyksos or the foreign chieftains.
34:51 They began to filter across the desert and they came down
34:54 and they settled in the Nile delta region of Egypt.
34:57 They had little trouble
34:58 overcoming the native population
34:59 for the Egyptians were not advanced in the art of warfare.
35:04 They introduced new weapons from Asia,
35:06 they had body armor and they introduced body armor
35:10 and bows and arrows and knives
35:12 and most importantly
35:13 they introduced the horse drawn chariot.
35:16 Now the Bible relates a fascination story
35:18 of Joseph who also as a Semite.
35:20 He was a Semitic slave from Palestine
35:23 and the Bible tells us that he came down
35:25 and he interpreted two dreams that pharaoh had,
35:27 two strange dreams.
35:29 One was about seven fat cows that came out of the river
35:32 and then seven thin cows that came out of the river.
35:35 And pharaoh was perplex by this.
35:37 Notice what the Bible says about it.
35:38 It's Genesis 41,
35:41 "God hath shown pharaoh what He is about to do.
35:44 Seven years of great abundance
35:46 are coming throughout the land of Egypt,
35:48 but seven years of famine will follow them.
35:50 Then all the abundance in Egypt will be forgotten
35:53 and the famine will ravage the land."
35:57 Joseph predicted seven years of plenty
35:59 to be followed by seven years of famine.
36:01 Well, pharaoh was perplexed by this dreadful news,
36:04 certainly he was familiar with what happened.
36:05 Sometimes it wasn't the lack of rain, it too much rain
36:08 and the Nile would overflow and the crops would rot.
36:11 And so he was very concerned, what should he do?
36:13 And so the Bible tell us
36:14 Joseph recommended wise counsel.
36:17 Joseph recommended this counsel, he said,
36:19 "Let Pharaoh appoint commissioners over the land
36:23 to take a fifth of the harvest of Egypt
36:26 during the seven years of abundance.
36:28 They should collect all the food
36:30 of these good years that are coming
36:31 and store up the grain under the authority of pharaoh,
36:33 to be kept in the cities for food.
36:36 This food should be held in reserve for the country,
36:39 to be used during the seven years of famine
36:41 that will come upon Egypt,
36:42 so that the country may not be ruined with famine."
36:47 The Bible says that pharaoh accepted
36:49 Joseph's interpretation of the dream,
36:51 released him from prison,
36:53 elevated him to vizier over Egypt.
36:55 The bible goes on to say that...
37:01 "So Pharaoh said to Joseph,
37:02 'I hereby put you in charge of the whole land of Egypt.'
37:05 Then Pharaoh took his signet ring from his finger
37:07 and put it on Joseph's finger.
37:09 He dressed him in fine linen
37:11 and put a gold chain around his neck.
37:14 And he had him ride in a chariot
37:18 as his second in command."
37:20 Who introduced the chariot to Egypt?
37:22 The Hyksos, Semites from Palestine.
37:26 And so we could see that
37:28 Joseph would fit into this period extremely well.
37:32 Bible chronology places this story of Joseph
37:34 right during the Hyksos rule.
37:36 Joseph was a Semite,
37:38 he'll be readily accepted by Semites
37:40 who were ruling Egypt.
37:41 Joseph rode in a chariot, the Semites,
37:44 the Hyksos introduced the chariot to Egypt.
37:47 Joseph's father, Jacob and his tribe
37:49 came down to live in the delta of Goshen.
37:53 Here we have a painting on the screen
37:55 from a tomb called Beni Hasan and it is very interesting
37:59 because you can see that these are not Egyptians.
38:02 These are clearly shepherds.
38:04 Egyptians didn't care
38:05 for taking care of sheep and their Semitic.
38:08 And so here we have Semitic shepherds
38:10 coming down and living in Egypt.
38:13 Now this is not about Jacob but its reflective
38:16 of the story of Jacob who was shepherd,
38:18 a Semitic shepherd from Palestine
38:20 who came down and lived in the delta region of Egypt.
38:23 Now the Egyptians, they are farmers
38:24 and not really shepherds
38:25 like they are in Israel or Palestine or Canaan.
38:29 And so they liked to grow their crops
38:31 and so they're very different group.
38:33 However, these Semitic shepherds
38:39 would have been readily accepted
38:41 by their racially related rulers of Egypt,
38:44 the Hyksos rulers.
38:46 They gladly welcomed them but this was about to change.
38:51 Seqenenre was a prince from Thebes,
38:54 he rebelled against the Hyksos dominated government.
38:57 He started a war of liberation. He made a noble effort.
39:00 Today, his skull is in the Cairo museum.
39:03 You can see all the holes in his skull
39:05 were he paid for his bravery with his life.
39:08 However, his sons Kamose and Ahmose,
39:11 they continued the war of liberation
39:14 and they were able to overthrow the Hyksos.
39:16 They drove them out of the land
39:18 and never again will the Hyksos
39:20 play a dominant role in the ancient world.
39:23 They become national heroes.
39:25 And they founded the powerful 18th dynasty.
39:29 Here's a story of Joseph, just a Jewish myth
39:32 as many people believe?
39:34 Well, there's no direct references
39:36 to Joseph in Egyptian history.
39:40 But don't be surprised, there are no really
39:42 direct references to the Hyksos in Egyptian history either.
39:45 You see, they didn't like to write about
39:47 bad things that happened to them in their diaries.
39:50 Expect for one man who had a tomb
39:52 and he had been a victor over them
39:54 and he wrote about his victorious achievements
39:57 in his tomb-- in his tomb walls.
40:00 But they did find this inscription
40:02 down near Aswan.
40:04 Fascinating, it says, "I collected corn,
40:06 I was watchful in time of sowing,
40:08 and when a famine arose
40:10 lasting many years, I distributed corn.
40:12 The Nile has not overflowed for a period of seven years.
40:17 Herbage fails, storehouses were built
40:19 and all that was in them has been consumed."
40:24 Wow, kind of parallels
40:25 to the story of Joseph, doesn't it?
40:27 The Egyptians did not make much,
40:28 as I said of the remaining Hyksos.
40:30 They didn't want the names
40:31 of the foreign rulers to be remembered
40:33 and the Hyksos were expelled from Egypt,
40:36 never again to decisive role in the ancient world.
40:39 And the Egyptians then made
40:42 the remaining Semites their slaves, their slaves.
40:47 Hebrew 1: 8 is fascinating to me,
40:50 I used to be perplexed by this.
40:52 It says, "Now a new king arose over Egypt,
40:54 who did not know Joseph."
40:56 I used to wonder-- if Joseph was so great,
40:58 how could a king not arise and know who he is?
41:01 That's because the previous kings
41:04 were Semitic Hyksos from the area of Palestine.
41:08 Now the local Egyptians have rose up.
41:10 So a new king arises over Egypt
41:12 who did not know Joseph, he said,
41:13 "Come, let us deal wisely with them,
41:15 lest they multiply and in the event of war,
41:17 they also join themselves to those who hate us,
41:20 and fight against us.
41:22 So they appointed taskmasters over them
41:24 to afflict them with hard labor."
41:27 While the enslave Hebrews manufactured bricks,
41:31 and the delta, the new kingdom pharaohs
41:34 were bringing Egypt to its greatest period of--
41:39 its most glorious periods,
41:40 untold well begin to pour in from Africa and Asia.
41:45 They launched massive buildings projects throughout the land
41:47 but there was no city more decorated then ancient Thebes.
41:51 You see, Thebes was the capital
41:53 of the two lands for over 1,500 years.
41:57 It was embellished by powerful kings
42:01 with names like Tuthmosis
42:03 and Rameses and Tutankhamun.
42:07 Two fabulous temples survive
42:09 revealing the greatness of the past.
42:11 First, I want to take you over to Luxor Temple
42:12 that was started by Amenhotep III.
42:14 It was dedicate to the Theben god Amun-Ra,
42:17 the sun god.
42:18 Who was added to by succeeding generations of pharaohs
42:20 including Tutankhamun
42:22 and of course Rameses the Great.
42:23 In front of the temple
42:25 they are actually six statues of Rameses,
42:27 four seated, two standing.
42:29 They're carved out of granite,
42:30 and if they were not carved out of granite,
42:31 you might have thought they were poured
42:32 from the same mold because they're almost exact.
42:35 They are two obelisks that stand there
42:37 and one of them says that
42:38 the Rameses built this great temple,
42:41 blithely overlooking the fact that it stood for 700 years.
42:44 He just added to the entrance to the temple.
42:47 Today, it's only one obelisk that stands there.
42:49 The other decorates Paris
42:51 and we can see these beautiful papyrus budded columns
42:55 and the lotus flowers,
42:56 they're beautiful by day or by night.
42:58 But Luxor was the small temple in town,
43:01 the worlds largest temple was 3 kilometers north.
43:05 Karnak evolved over 2,000 years.
43:07 It sprawls over a 150 acres.
43:10 Its sheer size makes it almost impossible
43:12 to get into perspective.
43:13 You approach through
43:15 the great avenue of the Sphinxes.
43:16 There are Sphinxes that led all the way down to the river
43:18 and then 3 kilometers
43:19 all the way back to Luxor temple.
43:21 You go through a great pile on into the four court
43:24 and it's amazing as you go through these courts.
43:26 We come to my favorite part of the temple,
43:28 the Hypostyle Hall and here you can see it on the screen.
43:31 And these columns are so big that the capitals
43:34 are large enough for 100 men to stand upon each capital.
43:39 Fabulous, they still hold seven ton beams
43:43 after all of these millenniums.
43:45 Near the scared lake,
43:46 I photographed this giant scarab beetle.
43:50 The beetle who pushes his larvae into--
43:52 out of the sand at sunrise became a symbol
43:55 of the resurrection to the ancients.
43:57 They wore them as amulets around their neck
43:59 and they put them over the hearts
44:01 of their mummies in death.
44:03 These columns of papyrus reed and lotus flowers
44:06 symbolized upper and lower Egypt.
44:08 They still retain some of their color after 3,500 years.
44:12 So I have to confess that I was really drawn
44:15 to this obelisk, that is here.
44:17 This obelisk was of Queen Hatshepsut,
44:19 mystery woman of ancient Egypt.
44:21 She was the daughter of Tuthmosis I.
44:23 Her father died without leaving any male heirs,
44:27 although he did have a son through a concubine.
44:30 But the royal blood was going through
44:32 his daughter Hatshepsut.
44:34 So she married, they did not have an heir,
44:38 they did not have a son.
44:40 However her husband, Tuthmosis II
44:42 had a child through a concubine.
44:45 The boy, Tuthmosis III was crowned
44:47 after his father's death.
44:48 As a lad, he co-ruled
44:50 with his step-mother aunt for several years
44:53 until she claimed the throne as her own.
44:56 She wore the ceremonial beard
44:59 and ruled as pharaoh for over 20 years.
45:01 She erected this magnificent obelisk
45:03 that we see here, it was taller than her father's by 30 feet.
45:07 She also constructed, what I believe
45:08 to be the most beautiful building in Egypt,
45:11 Deir el-Bahri.
45:12 This, by the way, was the scene of the massacre
45:15 of the German tourist
45:16 and the others several years ago.
45:18 But she-- built this beautiful,
45:21 most symmetrical temple in all of Egypt, Deir el-Bahri.
45:24 It was built on the west bank of the Nile
45:27 because it was her funerary temple,
45:29 the place were she was to be entombed throughout eternity.
45:33 Unfortunately, all of the release
45:36 of this remarkable woman have been chiseled out.
45:39 You can see here on the screen, they're chiseled out.
45:41 All up and down the Nile, references to her are gone.
45:46 She died, was buried
45:49 but her mummy has never been discovered.
45:51 Remember the reason for a mummy?
45:53 So the Ka could come back to it in the afterlife.
45:56 The worst thing in their world you could do
45:58 is not to kill somebody but to destroy their mummy.
46:03 Then the person will be bound
46:05 to endless wandering throughout eternity.
46:08 Now for a fast ending clue
46:10 that brings the Bible story of Moses into focus.
46:12 According to 1 King 6:1,
46:15 "In the four hundred and eightieth year
46:17 after the Israelites came out of Egypt,
46:19 in the fourth year of Solomon's reign over Israel,
46:22 he began to build the temple of the Lord."
46:25 Now according to the Bible,
46:26 when will the exodus take place?
46:31 Four hundred and eighty years
46:33 after the Israelites came out of Egypt.
46:36 They got to forget all about
46:37 what you know about the exodus right now.
46:38 Because the Bible says it was 480 years after the exodus
46:43 that Solomon began to build the temple of the Lord.
46:45 Well, we have some dates and that's kind of easy
46:47 to establish that the temple of Solomon
46:50 was constructed around 970 B.C.
46:53 So we can kind of add and go back
46:55 and see that that means the exodus would be
46:57 in the mid 15 century around 1450 B.C.
47:01 And we see then that Moses will be born
47:04 according to this chronology
47:06 right in the midst of the time of Thutmosis I.
47:10 Who had no male heirs,
47:12 he has a daughter who usurped the throne.
47:15 And so as we see Biblical chronology
47:17 we see that they would-- this would fit just perfectly.
47:20 This Thutmosis I would have been the pharaoh
47:23 who made the decree to kill all male babies.
47:27 All male Hebrew babies, I should say.
47:29 Now the poor were buried in the sand
47:32 or sometimes they'd be put into little reed baskets
47:34 and floated out into the Nile river
47:35 where it would sink and they would die.
47:37 So Moses parents follow the letter of the law.
47:39 They put their baby into a little reed basket,
47:42 but first, they sealed it with pitch so it wouldn't sink
47:44 Then they strategically placed it where they knew
47:47 Princess Hatshepsut would come to do her ritual bathing.
47:50 And as she came to do her bathing,
47:51 she heard the baby cry and she read in a glance
47:54 what had happened.
47:55 But she thought, I'm barren,
47:57 the Nile god has smiled upon me and given me a child.
48:02 And so she took the child, she arranged for his mother,
48:05 his mother to nurse him and she gave him the name Moses
48:09 because Moses means born-of or drawn-from.
48:13 Okay, there was Ahmoses, remember one of the liberators?
48:16 It means he was born of the deified soul Ka-ah.
48:21 There was Kamoses born the deified soul Ka.
48:23 There was a Thutmosis, born of the scribal god thoth.
48:27 There was Ramoses born of the sun god Ra,
48:29 we call him Rameses today.
48:32 And most likely, the child would have been Hapimoses,
48:35 born to the Nile god Hapi.
48:37 Moses would have dropped the reference
48:39 to that Egyptian name after he left Egypt.
48:43 So this was a very popular name,
48:44 it fits into what we knew of Egyptian history today.
48:48 Hatshepsut adopted the boy
48:50 arranged for his maternal mother to nurse him
48:52 until he came of age.
48:53 He was educated by the priest
48:55 and became a favorite of pharaoh.
48:56 He was bright and witty and a great soldier.
48:59 When he husband died without leaving a legal air,
49:02 she intended to put Moses upon the throne.
49:05 But the step-son was opposing this,
49:08 the priests of Amon-Ra were opposing because they,
49:11 they noted a strange sense of independence in the lad.
49:14 And so they wanted to put the other boy on the throne.
49:18 They figured with the child born from the concubine,
49:21 Thutmosis III, after Moses killed the Egyptian foreman
49:24 and he fled into the desert Sinai,
49:26 Hatshepsut days were numbered.
49:28 Soon the powerful priests moved against her
49:30 and established Thutmosis III as pharaoh.
49:33 Immediately he dispatched soldiers
49:35 to go throughout the land
49:36 chiseling out all references to Hatshepsut.
49:41 She disappears from the annals of the history,
49:43 all of the mummies of this dynasty has been found.
49:46 Hers is the only exception.
49:49 They would have had reason for the ultimate revenge.
49:52 Thutmosis not only had reason to murder her
49:54 but to destroy her mummy
49:55 and confine her soul to endless wandering.
49:59 Thutmosis invaded the land of Palestine and Syria 27 times,
50:05 almost every year of his reign.
50:07 The wealth of Asia poured in, the wealth of Africa poured in.
50:10 The country experienced its greatest power
50:12 under Thutmosis III.
50:13 The great building program needed inexpensive labor
50:17 and he specifically says,
50:19 that he used Semitic slaves in his work.
50:22 Moses would have approached his step-brother.
50:26 He would approached his step-brother
50:27 and he said, let my people go.
50:31 And the Bible records the words of Thutmosis,
50:33 it says, "Who is the Lord,
50:35 that I should obey him and let Israel go?
50:37 I don't know the Lord and I will not let Israel go."
50:40 I hear him saying brother Moses,
50:41 you had your opportunity and you blew it.
50:43 Now you're just a shepherd out there in Midian,
50:44 why don't you go back where you came from?
50:47 You're not my servant, I will not Israel go.
50:50 Now Egyptologists have established the Moses--
50:52 that Thutmosis I died March 17, 1450.
50:56 They say he was 60 years old when he died.
50:59 Now when they discovered his mummy,
51:00 they examined all these mummies and they x-rayed them.
51:03 And they established that
51:05 Thutmosis III mummy was 40 years old.
51:09 Now if they said he was 60 when he died
51:10 and yet the mummy's 40, what's going on here?
51:13 If he was the one who had gone out to the Red Sea
51:17 and drowned in the Red Sea,
51:19 and they could not find his body,
51:20 they had to bring back the body of someone else to embalm
51:23 and to do the whole elaborate ceremony
51:25 and that's what took place.
51:26 Now do you remember the time of Passover?
51:28 Ah, spring of the year.
51:30 He died March 17, spring of the year.
51:33 Spring of the year.
51:35 And so this would be fascinating insight into Moses,
51:39 this would be the time that he will live.
51:40 The Bible tells us this about Moses in Hebrews 11.
51:43 It says, "When Moses had grown up,
51:44 he refused to be known
51:45 as the son of Pharaoh's daughter.
51:47 He regarded disgrace for the sake of Messiah
51:50 as of greater value than the pleasures of Egypt,
51:52 because he was looking ahead to his reward."
51:54 I've puzzled over that,
51:55 why would anyone step away from such a wealth.
52:00 Because he looked ahead to his reward.
52:04 He believed the reward of-- of the Hebrews would be
52:07 greater than the reward of the Egyptians.
52:10 Now if he would have been a humble
52:11 and pliable servant of the priests,
52:13 he would have received a rich and powerful burial
52:15 that's beyond our wildest imagination.
52:18 But he didn't want the reward
52:19 that came with the treasures of Egypt.
52:21 He looked ahead to a different reward,
52:23 you see, as soon as the pharaoh came to power,
52:25 he begin planning for his death.
52:26 Whether it was building a pyramid
52:28 or tunneling into the west bank at Thebes,
52:30 only one tomb has come down intact from that period
52:33 revealing the priceless treasures of Egypt.
52:35 It was discovered in 1922 by Howard Carter
52:39 and his patron, Lord Carnavron,
52:41 after eight years of searching he was almost ready to give up.
52:44 But three days into the new dig season,
52:47 he found steps leading down to a sealed doorway.
52:50 Carter summoned Carnavron from England.
52:52 On November 26, a lower door was breached
52:55 and Carter peered through a small hole into the tomb.
53:00 Listen to his words, he says, "With trembling hands
53:03 I made a tiny breach in the upper left-hand corner.
53:06 Darkness and blank space
53:07 as far as an iron testing rod could see.
53:10 Candle tests were applied as a precaution
53:13 against possible foul gases,
53:14 and then widening the hole a little,
53:16 I inserted the candle and peered in,
53:18 Lord Carnarvon standing anxiously beside me
53:20 to hear the verdict.
53:21 At first I could see nothing,
53:23 the hot air escaping from the chamber
53:24 causing the candle flame to flicker,
53:27 but presently as my eyes grew accustomed to the light,
53:31 details of the room within emerged slowly from the midst.
53:35 Strange animals, statues and gold,
53:39 everywhere the glint of gold.
53:41 For the moment, an eternity
53:43 it must have seemed to the others standing by,
53:45 I was struck dumb with amazement,
53:46 and when Lord Carnarvon,
53:47 unable to stand the suspense any longer,
53:49 inquired anxiously, 'Can you see anything?'
53:52 It was all I could do to get out the words,
53:55 'Yes, wonderful things.'"
53:58 What Carter saw on his initial glimpse
54:00 was only the contents of the antechamber.
54:03 Which centuries earlier have been entered by thieves
54:06 and left in disarray.
54:08 Soon additional rooms were discovered,
54:10 opened for the first time
54:11 since the death of the boy-king.
54:12 No one could comprehend the staggering wealth.
54:15 The glory of the art of the past until this moment
54:18 of discovering Tutankhamun tomb yielded undreamed of treasures.
54:24 A life size statue of King Tut,
54:26 mason, rod in hands stood there by the door.
54:29 The skin in black resin
54:31 symbolized the color of rebirth.
54:33 Everything in the tombs spilling out.
54:35 The hope that he would be reborn in the after life
54:37 and enjoy the incredible wealth that was buried with him.
54:40 His death mask of beaten gold reveals the handsome features
54:45 of the boy-king who died around 18 years of age.
54:48 The beard under his chin identifying him as one
54:51 with Osiris, the god of the dead.
54:53 The throne of King Tut was woodened
54:54 and covered with gold and precious jewels.
54:58 And carved into his footstool were the traditional enemies,
55:00 the Asiatics and the Nubians.
55:03 He was buried in a nest of coffins, seven coffins.
55:06 One being 22 carat gold and weighing 296 pounds.
55:10 More than a 143 jewels were distributed over his body.
55:14 More than 5,000 priceless treasures of art
55:17 were found in the tomb, effigies of gods and goddess,
55:20 jewels and faces and chest of ivory
55:22 and furniture and other fabulous things of beauty
55:26 were removed by Carter during the next nine years.
55:29 Today, thousands of them are on display
55:30 in the Cairo museum in Egypt, the Egyptian museum in Cairo.
55:35 Now while we're overwhelmed by the beauty,
55:37 we have to remember he was a minor king
55:39 ruling only 9 years.
55:41 Think of the incredible tomb of someone like Thutmosis III.
55:45 But Moses turned away from the treasures of Egypt,
55:48 preferring a different reward.
55:50 Why would anyone turn away from such a funeral as this?
55:54 Because he believed the religion of Egypt
55:58 with its belief in the Ka
55:59 and the Ba were only fairy tales.
56:02 Fables invented by the priest to perpetuate their wealth.
56:09 The words of the 49th Psalm symbolize the reason
56:13 I believe that Moses, left Egypt.
56:16 He said, "Do not be overawed when a man grows rich,
56:18 when the splendor of his houses increases.
56:20 For he will take nothing with time when he dies.
56:22 Though while he lived he counted himself blessed,
56:25 he will join the generation of his fathers,
56:27 who will never see the light of life.
56:29 For all can see that wise men die,
56:31 and leave wealth to others.
56:32 Their tombs will remain their houses forever.
56:34 But God will redeem my life from the grave.
56:38 He will surely take me to himself."
56:40 Let's pray together, eternal God,
56:42 I thank you so much for the opportunity
56:44 to survey ancient Egypt.
56:45 But we ponder the question of Moses,
56:47 why would anyone turn away?
56:49 Because he looked ahead to his reward.
56:51 Not a reward of being buried with gold,
56:54 but a reward of living forever with You.
56:56 My father, I pray that You will help us also
56:58 to make the right choices like Moses did long ago.
57:01 I pray in Jesus name, amen.
57:04 Well, again we thank you for joining us
57:06 in this wonderful journey
57:07 and we hope that you can join us for our next episode
57:10 in this thrilling series on archeology
57:12 and prophecy in foot steps of Jesus.


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Revised 2015-05-14